Is Obama a closet Muslim?
Lived in Indonesia (predominently Muslim country) between the ages of 6-10 (very impressionable years).
At heart, is he really a Muslim?
If not, given no Christian involvement as a child, how and when did he convert? Has he ever been baptized?
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M$7 Answers
For evidence that President Obama is secretly Jewish or Pastafarian, see my recent question:
http://www.mahalo.com/answers/is-president-obama-really-jewish-or-pastafarian
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All that said WHO CARES?. I mean at the end of the day does it matter if he believes in anything at all? What is important is his deeds and actions and whether or not they coincide with your own.
What I've read and watched over time. Took a few religious study courses in college and such...
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That is my analysis of the situation regarding the news and public in general. Personally I like Obama and I like Jews and Pastafarians so I project that on him. That's much more reasonable. A dubiously earned compliment is much more acceptable than an undeserved insult.
@albanian, it speaks volumes about what is on your mind re "All they really mean is that they don't like both, thinking them foreign and un-American." There's not a single hint of that in anyone else's questions, comments or answers on this page.
Yes, it is apparent that the folks who think President Obama is Muslim not only are ignorant regarding the President but also are exceedingly ignorant regarding Islam. All they really mean is that they don't like both, thinking them foreign and un-American.
Read your news and come up with a credible source.
I mean, hard, cold numbers to cash the check you just wrote.
The President is Christian, not Muslim.
The following is a direct quote from nola.com (as in New Orleans, Louisana):
"Growing number of Americans incorrectly call Barack Obama a Muslim, poll says
Published: Thursday, August 19, 2010, 9:02 AM Updated: Thursday, August 19, 2010, 1:57 PM
Americans increasingly are convinced -- incorrectly -- that President Barack Obama is a Muslim, and a growing number are thoroughly confused about his religion.
(Photo caption: Sen. Barack Obama visited the First Emanuel Baptist Church in Central City as a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president in August 2007. Church Pastor Charles Joseph Southall III and the choir put a blessing upon him.)
Nearly one in five people, or 18 percent, said they think Obama is Muslim, up from the 11 percent who said so in March 2009, according to a poll released Thursday. The proportion who correctly say he is a Christian is down to just 34 percent.
The largest share of people, 43 percent, said they don't know his religion, an increase from the 34 percent who said that in early 2009.
The survey, conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center and its affiliated Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, is based on interviews conducted before the controversy over whether Muslims should be permitted to construct a mosque near the World Trade Center site. Obama has said he believes Muslims have the right to build an Islamic center there, though he's also said he won't take a position on whether they should actually build it.
Take a reader poll
* What religious group does President Barack Obama belong to?
In a separate poll by Time magazine/ABT SRBI conducted Monday and Tuesday -- after Obama's comments about the mosque -- 24 percent said they think he is Muslim, 47 percent said they think he is Christian and 24 percent didn't know or didn't respond.
In addition, 61 percent opposed building the Muslim center near the Trade Center site and 26 percent said they favor it.
The Pew poll found that about three in 10 of Obama's fiercest political rivals, Republicans and conservatives, say he is a Muslim. That is up significantly from last year and far higher than the share of Democrats and liberals who say so. But even among his supporters, the number saying he is a Christian has fallen since 2009, with just 43 percent of blacks and 46 percent of Democrats saying he is Christian.
Among independents, 18 percent say Obama is Muslim -- up from 10 percent last year.
Pew analysts attribute the findings to attacks by his opponents and Obama's limited attendance at religious services, particularly in contrast with Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, whose worship was more public.
Andrew Kohut, the Pew Research Center's director, said the confusion partly reflects "the intensification of negative views about Obama among his critics." Alan Cooperman, the Pew Forum's associate director for research, said that with the public hearing little about Obama's religion, "maybe there's more possibility for other people to make suggestions that the president is this or he's really that or he's really a Muslim."
Obama is the Christian son of a Kenyan Muslim father and a Kansas mother. From age 6 to 10, Obama lived in predominantly Muslim Indonesia with his mother and Indonesian stepfather. His full name, Barack Hussein Obama, sounds Muslim to many."
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M$Vierect
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This was an excellent question to ask because it brought to the forefront the misconception that 18% of the general population is having and which is all over the news. Other posters have done an excellent job of clarifying the misconception.
I'm voting your hateful answer down because it does nothing to answer the question and is very hurtful.
My point in saying what i said is very valid. See how i mentioned something that had nothing to do with the situation and run left with it. Waco was a government call to kill the kids and adults invovled. now yes the adults had a choice but did the kids? You can be mad or offended all you want who cares. Most of the posts on this site are so uneducated and without proof meaning they are rumors and continued bs. About the philly situation i figured you wouldnt know because most dont follow news as a whole you follow selected news which makes your debate useless and basically onesided. The philly police dropped a bomb on a housing complex then held back the fire department for hours so they couldnt put the fire out. Now that was terroristic. And further more what does Obamas religious views have to do with anything? Funny how when i state some unfounded facts about the origional poster you respond but where is your response to the ridiculousness of the question to begin with? Now i know you want to be captain save a hoe and thats fine but back it up first. Stop Obama hating and face the real problem which is the government dont care about anybody that is not affiliated with their gang. Yes gang. These are situations that because they wasnt deemed muslim it wasnt a religious issue but in reality they all played a part invovling religion. We just pick n choose which religions we decide to hate. I know one thing i have never heard of a rapist or childmolesting muslim but i have heard of many cases of abuse within the christian and catholic churches so lets see some posts about that instead of was the president a muslim as a child. what were you as a child? you me and everyone else didnt get to choose what religion we wanted to follow the society choose for us and it wasnt until you and me and everyone else became old enough to decide for ourselves that we pick which one we want to follow. With that being said unless you study many religions non of us know what one is legit. We hope we pick the right one but we dont really know or have proof of any. Truth is there is one GOD with many different faces for all to believe in the likeness of them. I believe in a higher power and follow no religious claiming book. God is God regardless of what you call him and what approach and steps you use to communicate with him. God says in every religion believe in ME. So what others involved theirselves into the matter but stating you must believe in them also. After you die nobody cares what religion you follow because you no longer matter.
Now, I ramble on, but this one makes no sense. What on earth does it have to do with child molesters? And it is indeed racist, homophobic, and about the whole Philly thing and Waco thing, I don't know what happened in Philly, but let me refresh your memory on Waco:
"As a result of his first-hand observations and work with the children this psychiatrist was uniquely afforded an inside look at life within the compound and its internal group dynamics.
Perry wrote that the "children lived in a world of fear" and that "even babies were not immune....
"Branch Davidians and their children were kept constantly in the state of readiness for battle through "military drills, interrupted sleep and one-on-one fighting." And if the "children did not want to participate or were not vicious enough in battle training, they were humiliated and sometimes beaten."
Perry writes that within the armed camp known to its inhabitants as "Ranch Apocalypse" even "the youngest members were taught how to handle guns."
Source: http://www.rickross.com/reference/waco/waco337.html
Former followers told authorities that Koresh beat the children until they were bruised and bleeding. One defector, Marc Breault, had hired detectives to investigate, and when contacted by the ATF, he supplied a number of detailed descriptions of his former associates.
He denounced Koresh, accusing him of child abuse and polygamy. Breault also described numerous minors whom Koresh had subjected to marriage and sex. The youngest was only 12 years old"
Source: http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h2045.html
I think I found your child molester. This definitely deserves a vote down because it brings nothing to the table but hate speech, and it's completely unsubstantiated.
If you're not already a politician or an attorney, you have a great future ahead of you. The ability to mix facts and BS to sell something convincingly is a rare talent.
You need a little practice. Some street cred--credible sources that say they see it the way you say it--wouldn't hurt. And it will help people see, "Hey, you know what? Maybe they're right."
"When you walk the walk, you gotta back it all up. Can you talk the talk?"
I'm the first source. Listen up: I LIVED in the Philly area--Princeton, NJ--in 1985 when the MOVE bombing went down. But forgive me. After high school, college, a few successful careers, a marriage, a child, travels around the world, over five years of medical drama--including being minutes if not seconds from death several times--a total of 26 years (a full 2/3 of my life) and halfway across the country after my freshman year of high school--I suppose it slipped my mind.
So, with the help of the Internet, I looked it up. USA Today had a piece on it.
Read the news yourself. You're conveniently omitting that the MOVE people were wanted on a number of charges, including parole violations and possession of explosives. But the police didn't bomb them. Apparently, according to the report in USA Today, Philly's first black mayor dropped a bomb on a black neighborhood:
"A commission that investigated found that Goode and two other officials, police commissioner Gregore Sambor and fire commissioner William Richmond, had been "grossly negligent...."
"Sambor resigned six months later. Richmond retired in 1988. Goode apologized tearfully on TV and was re-elected in 1988. ..
"Philadelphia has spent $42 million in financial settlements, investigation and rebuilding to try to fix what happened that day. It was a law enforcement failure so spectacular that it would not be equaled until the siege near Waco eight years later. A month ago, 24 homeowners won a $12 million suit against the city for the botched rebuilding and repairs of their homes...
"Eight years later, the standoff between federal agents and the Branch Davidians near Waco, Texas, echoed the MOVE scenario. Since then, says Henry Ruth, who served on commissions investigating MOVE and Waco, police have changed their tactics. In 1996, the Montana Freemen standoff ended peacefully when federal agents simply waited out the Freemen."
Source: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-05-11-philadelphia-bombing_x.htm
As for Vern, ("Vernon Howell filed a petition in California State Superior Court in Pomona on May 15, 1990, to legally change his name "for publicity and business purposes" to David Koresh"), I was in college when Waco went down 1992, and you forgot or omitted this: "The 1993 U.S. Department of Justice report sets out allegations of historical child sexual and physical abuse. ATF Special Agent David Aguilera had interviewed former Branch Davidian Jeannine Bunds, who claimed that Koresh had fathered at least fifteen children with various women and young girls at the compound. According to Bunds, some of the girls who had babies fathered by Koresh were as young as 12 years old. "
Source: http://www.answers.com/topic/david-koresh
(Like I said, I found your child molester. I guess kids wouldn't bed down with a guy whose name was always being used by this guy:)
Believe me, I'm a parent and if anyone did anything to my child I'd be on the phone with everyone I could be--including State and Federal Government Office to which I have access (those relationships don't form instantly by looking them up in the phone book), and I'd put the 24/7 full-court press on to have every law enforcement agency which might have jurisdiction squeeze the person responsible. John Walsh did it for thousands of kids after his son Adam was abducted and killed:
"Adam's death, and his father's subsequent activism, helped put faces on milk cartons, started fingerprinting programs, increased security at schools and stores and spurred the creation of missing persons units at every large police department.
"It also prompted legislation to create a national center, database and toll-free line devoted to missing children, and led to the start of "America's Most Wanted," which brought those cases into millions of homes."
Source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,467905,00.html
Unfortunately, in Philly, they made a massive judgment call mistake and Waco could have been handled better, too. The kids were innocent bystanders and became collateral damage. "Broadly defined, collateral damage is unintentional damage or incidental damage affecting facilities, equipment or personnel occurring as a result of military actions directed against targeted enemy forces or facilities."
Source: http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/usaf/afpam14-210/part20.htm#page180
The term is commonly used when describing things such as employees laid off in business takeovers and other events where innocent people get hurt in some way and they are not the target. For example, in a bank robbery and hostage standoff, if the person or persons that are holding innocent people hostage fire a shot, SWAT teams will usually take that as a cue to enter the building--and it is unfortunate, but just as in a war, innocent people sometimes get killed in the process of trying to save the lives of other innocent people.
If one's religion doesn't matter after one dies, you and I would not see things like these, surrounded by hundreds if not thousands of similar ones:
Unless you have a long career in politics under your belt or you've worked your way up to Executive Vice President of a major international corporation, I have convinced bigger people of bigger things with less effort and less negativity.
I will put here what I put in one of albanian's questions: frankly, I'm dying and a circular debate to which there is no end--given the opportunity, you're not selling me on your point of view--is pointless and it is no longer an entertaining challenge to me..
"Maybe you are a closet Muslim, gay, rapist we don't know."
I know read that somewhere... but where...?
YES! It was in your answer that was deserving of the down vote I gave it.
A best answer has been chosen. Game over. Listen to the song in the video.
Thank you very much for your time! I greatly appreciate it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEEunvd7ZX8
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Good job lightzone, thanks for the ignorance.
(You heard it here first->) "Ignorance is bliss, ONLY to the ignoramous." - Mai Vang
I've wanted to use that for WEEKS now.
Thanks for being such a clear example of what I was talking about.
Better make sure you can cash a check before you write it.
EVERY MAJOR NEWS OUTLET says he's a Christian.
Goodness Gracious, CHRISTIAN TODAY even has a thing on him:
Obama: 'I'm praying a lot these days'
by Michelle A Vu, Christian PostPosted: Friday, February 5, 2010, 8:46 (GMT)
WASHINGTON – US President Barack Obama called for civility in the public square as he said prayer could help people become more humble during his address at the National Prayer Breakfast.
“For while prayer can buck us up when we are down, keep us calm in a storm; while prayer can stiffen our spines to surmount an obstacle – and I assure you I’m praying a lot these days – prayer can also do something else,” Obama said.
“It can touch our hearts with humility. It can fill us with a spirit of brotherhood. It can remind us that each of us are children of a awesome and loving God.”
Obama called on Washington lawmakers to overcome division and learn how to “disagree without being disagreeable”. He said no political party had a “monopoly on truth” and that lawmakers needed to leave their comfort zones to bridge divisions.
“Surely you can question my policies without questioning my faith, or, for that matter, my citizenship,” he said, drawing laughter.
Source: http://www.christiantoday.com/article/obama.im.praying.a.lot.these.days/25239.htm
January 16, 2008
Barack Obama: I'm no Muslim
"Barack Obama was directly confronted on prime time television last night over allegations swirling around the internet that he is a secret Muslim who worships the Koran, during a Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas.
Mr Obama, who was raised as a Christian by his white mother despite his Kenyan father being Muslim, has been dogged by smears and innuendo for months that he is in fact an Islamist trying to enter the Oval office by stealth.
"Let's make clear what the facts are: I am a Christian. I have been sworn in with a Bible. I pledge allegiance the American flag and lead the pledge of allegiance sometimes in the United States Senate when I'm presiding."
Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article3194740.ece
Here is a reference I found to President Obama, then a candidate, eating bacon. With a Jewish politician who was avoiding it, no less.
"...a recent breakfast meeting between Obama and NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
The two political titans ate at the New York Luncheonette at 135 East 50th St. in midtown Manhattan, where they talked for more than 30 minutes...Obama munched his bacon, eggs over easy and toast and Bloomberg his scrambled eggs and potatoes..."
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2007/12/sweet_column_obamabloomberg_bl.html
If you did not know, most Jews do not eat bacon even though the largest USA denomination, Reform Judaism, allows it. There is no Islamic equivalent to Reform, all meat from swine is strictly forbidden to Muslims of all types.
President Obama reports having been baptized in his 2006 book "The Audacity of Hope" at the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. That would have been in the 1980's. The UCC is a mainline Protestant Church with very liberal leanings that gives a great deal of independence to its congregations and members.
http://www.barackobama.com/factcheck/2007/11/12/obama_has_never_been_a_muslim_1.php
Without this turning into a discussion about Jews and not Obama, ask 10 Conservative Jews at random if they keep kosher. Dollars to donuts you get 70% or so that do not. I only knew one person who had a kosher home--and that was because her mother did, because that's how she grew up. The girl--now, twenty years later, a woman with two children, will eat pork, love to go out for seafood and turn her light switches on and off between sundown Friday and sundown.Saturday
A broad brush, indeed.
Here is a source on what Muslims think about dogs.
Apparently there is an exception for owning farm, herding, and hunting dogs. But there is no tolerance for pet dogs or even guide dogs (which had not been invented when the religion and its texts were devised).
http://ehsaan.com/petdogs.html
I just had a large comment but inadvertently erased it, but I'll recreate a small portion of it here:
nancyke11y: I have worked in DC, three blocks from The White House, and I've seen people being foamed down in the middle of the street because their office received what was thought to be Anthrax (I think 1994). I've called a bomb squad myself for a suspicious package left in a hallway--I was on the property management team for a large office building. I've had Secret Service show up at my office before I could hang up a phone after calling 911 about a reported violent attack. (The guy who reported he'd been stabbed had disappeared, and no formal report was filed--but those guys don't play).
If no one talks about it, no one knows about it. And no one reports it.
If you're planning on going to a major city such as New York (I grew up in NJ and have been into Manhattan hundreds of times) or Washington and expecting to never have a threat present--I think you need cable or satellite TV and a blast-proof bunker.
And albanian: A very broad brush used to paint Reformed Jews as "Kosheresque." I grew up in a community that was mostly Conservative and now live in a town where 80% of the Jews are Reform Jews. Almost everyone I know will have bacon, and I just had BBQ ribs for dinner last night, in fact. I'd eat a cheeseburger--why not a bacon cheeseburger? And shrimp, lobster, scallops, clams, etc.
I was a resident of Maryland for a while--it's entirely inconceivable that I'm the only Jew who ever had a shrimp po-boy or something with andoille sausage--pork--in it at Louisiana Kitchen in Bethedsa, or who ever sat down with a mallet and a bushel of crabs at Bethesda Crab House, across the street from Louisiana Kitchen.
In 2009, Montgomery County's estimated population was 971,600. A 2000 study showed that over 9% of the county identified itself as Jewish, not far behind my birthplace of Brooklyn--Kings County, NY, at 15%. surprisingly, it's above where I grew up--Middlesex County, NJ, which only shows 6.0% (In 2000, I was one of those in Montgomery County, MD. I now live in St. Louis County, MO, which shows a 4.0% Jewish population in that same report..)
In a county with roughly one million people (rounded up for simplicity), I could not have been the only Jew in 90,000 to have ever eaten bacon, shellfish and/or a cheeseburger.
All in all, an it appears to be an unsubstantiated over-generalization at best.
Sources:.
http://www.louisianabethesda.com/
http://www.bethesdabigcrabs.com/menu.nxg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_County,_Maryland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Jews#Distribution_of_Jewish-Americans
My point was only that most Jews do not eat bacon. The dietary laws are not kept up by Reform Jews, usually only a few cultural remnants remain of those rules, often only kept up on the holidays. But with regard to this answer, Mayor Bloomberg was not eating bacon, and there certainly was no pressure on Obama to eat bacon; it might even have been considered polite for him to avoid it if he thought of it. But it clearly did not even occur to him, which would not have been the case if he were Muslim.
Personally I think the dietary laws were on the right track but ought to be updated; but, that is a whole different discussion.
A Muslim is allowed to be President of the USA. It is specifically in the Constitution that there can be no test of religion to hold any government office.
However, voters rightly object to being lied to. If the President had been lying about his religion that would be cause for outrage, while not illegal. As it happens, it is clear that he has not been lying and that the rumormongers are either hypocritical or idiots.
I want to know if being a muslim barred anyone from being a president of USA? if not, what is the noise about?....think about job, foreclosures, etc...
It is also forbidden to Muslims to drink any alcohol, even beer! Here is one of many photos of President Obama having a beer.
I have to given you exceptional credit for making a very stong case re Obama not being a closet Muslim. Actually, I think it was necessary given all the press to the contrary lately. (Not that the press is saying he's Muslim, but that there is the impression he is.)
Good job!
I still think it's unfair to say that just because someone doesn't like the President, doesn't mean they don't like Muslims. I also think it is unfair to go in that direction at all at this time, considering that by and large, private US citizens are the target of radical Muslims in the name of their religion. That's not to say that all Muslims by any stretch of the imagination are hurtful or even agree with what is happening (kind of like Germans and Nazis), but it's just not a good time to ask citizens giving up precious freedoms (think having to submit to random search and seizure in airports) to not have misgivings about Muslims in general. It's just better to not discuss it until we are no longer in danger of going to a Broadway show on a Saturday afternoon with our children.
Here's a link to a professional pundit and a political scientists who share my conclusion about the motive of those saying President Obama is Muslim:
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/religion/post/2010/08/obama-muslim-pew-christian/1
Christianity is very popular in poor Black neighborhoods. Here in New Orleans most Blacks are Catholic or radical Protestant. But President Obama apparently encountered liberal mainline Protestants in Chicago:
"Obama Found Faith During Community Organizing Days. "It was at Trinity United Church of Christ here, in the late 1980s, that Senator Obama says he found religion. Raised in a secular household, with ancestral roots running from Islam to Baptist to atheist, Obama had grown up a skeptic. But Mr. Wright's blend of scripture and social action resonated with Obama, then a young community organizer in black neighborhoods ravaged by steel-mill closings." Science Monitor, 7/16/07"
Here's three Christian pastors who swear Obama's Christian because he prays with them:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/08/19/1783910/pastors-who-pray-with-obama-say.html
Of course you can't believe Christian clerics because they are bound to be prejudiced but I thought I would add the source anyway.
Worth repeating for other commentors:
This was an important question to ask because it brings to the forefront the misconception that 18% of the general population is having and which is all over the news. By engaging in meaningful discussion truths can be revealed and philosophies explored.
Impressive deductive reasoning re the dog. Not sure if that's really an indication of preferencial leanings or just a function of being Americanized.
How did he connect with Christianity?
THIS IS SIN IN ISLAM BUT HE IS MUSLIM SIN AND FAITH IS DIFFERENCE